Sword and Pen (The Great Library #5)(5)

By the time Jess had examined all that, they’d walked to the street that led in front of the Serapeum. The guard posts were manned by High Garda, and roaming automata as well; sphinxes stalked on lion paws, rustling metal wings and staring with red eyes in their sculpted metal human faces. One followed them a few paces, which made Jess nervous; he watched it carefully to be sure it hadn’t been missed in the rewriting of how to identify enemy from friend. But it soon lost interest and padded away to sink down in a comfortable crouch, watching traffic pass.

“Thank God,” Dario said. He’d noted it, too. “I loathe those things.”

“You’ve stopped them before.”

“And will again, I have no doubt. But I’m grateful for each and every time I don’t have to fight for my life. I’m not as clever with them as you are. Or as fearless.”

That, Jess thought, was pretty remarkable; he’d not heard Dario confess something like that in quite a while. Possibly ever. The Spaniard naturally assumed he was the best at absolutely everything, and even when proven wrong often insisted until everyone half believed him. It had taken some time for Jess to overcome his general annoyance and realize what a vulnerability that large an ego could be. He hadn’t yet used that knowledge against Dario. He hadn’t needed to.

But it was always good to spot a weakness, even in an ally and friend.

Scholar Wolfe hadn’t been exaggerating; he did know how to reach the Archivist’s office. It involved a journey past sharp-eyed High Garda, more automata—including an Anubis-masked god statue that made Jess flash back to his dream and the reality it had mirrored—down hallways that seemed different to what Jess remembered. “It’s a self-aligning maze,” Wolfe told him when he pointed that out. “There are keys. You look for them encoded in the decorations. The alignments depend on the time, day, month, and year. Rather clever. Heron himself invented the machinery.” Jess almost turned to Thomas to comment on that, ready for the German’s effusive happiness; Thomas worshipped Heron almost as a god himself. But Thomas wasn’t with them. And it surprised Jess how much that dimmed his mood.

“Let’s just get on with it,” he said, and Wolfe gave him an appraising look, then nodded and led them on without more discussion. The path took them through the forbidding interior Hall of Gods, with all the giant, silent automata on their plinths . . . except for the ones who’d been dispatched to the Colosseum to kill the Library’s rebels. Those had been hacked apart. If they were ever to be rebuilt, Jess thought, maybe it would be better to sculpt them out of stone or simple metal. Make them symbols instead of weapons.

But he’d rather not see them again, ever.

They arrived in a hub of halls that led out in spokes; those held the offices of the Curia. All of them dead now, or fled with the Archivist. The quiet seemed ominous.

“This is a bit tricky as well,” Wolfe said, and showed the two of them where, how, and when to press certain keys on the wall to open the hallway to the Archivist’s private office. “Elite High Garda soldiers would normally be in charge of this. Good thing they’re all gone.”

“Are they?” Dario asked. “How do we know they didn’t flee here and fortify his office? There could be an entire company of the bastards waiting for us.”

It was a decent question, and better warning. Jess drew his sidearm. From beneath his robe, Wolfe produced something else; it took a moment for Jess to recognize it, but the elegantly crafted lines gave it away. Thomas’s work. That was a Ray of Apollo, upgraded and with better materials. Lethally concentrated light.

“Better to be sure,” Wolfe said, and switched the weapon on. Jess made sure his own was set to killing shots, and nodded. When Jess looked back at Dario, he found the Spaniard had produced a very lovely sword, filigreed and fancied to within an inch of its life but no less dangerous for that in the hands of an expert. Which Dario was. He also had a High Garda gun in his left hand, the mirror of Jess’s.

“You know how to use that?” Jess nodded at the gun. Dario gave him one of his trademark one-raised-eyebrow mocking looks.

“Better than you, scrubber.”

Untrue. Dario could certainly kill him with a sword, but Jess was a very good shot. Unless the arrogant royal had been drilling in target practice with that likely stolen gun, he wasn’t going to match any High Garda soldier.

Trust Dario to think he could.

Didn’t matter, at least at the moment. Jess followed Wolfe into the hallway that revealed itself, and down the spacious, carpeted expanse. This, he remembered. The carpet alone was worth half a kingdom, and the recovered Babylonian walls with their Assyrian lions were just as impressive. An ancient Chinese jade vase as delicate as an eggshell glowed under a skylight.

And there was the neat, clean desk ahead. The desk of the Archivist’s assistant, Neksa—Neksa, whom Brendan had loved. Who’d died for their sins.

Wolfe paused at her desk and looked at the two of them, each in turn. “Ready?” he asked. Jess nodded. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Dario echo him. He felt the hot tension of his nerves, and that was good. Paranoia was a habit these days, but it also might help him stay alive today. Might. No fear, though. That seemed wrong, but temporarily useful.

Wolfe pressed a button on Neksa’s desk, and the door behind it slid open. Wolfe held up a hand to stop them from rushing in, but he needn’t have bothered; neither of them moved. They watched and listened from where they were. There was natural light streaming in from the expanse of windows that overlooked the harbor and the threatening mass of ships clustered on the horizon. Storm clouds were forming out to sea as well. That would complicate things.